5 trading courses for beginners in the market

Tempting as it may be to sign up for a get-rich-quick trading course for beginners advertised in the weekend papers, it’s worth doing a bit of research.

Courses range from a few evenings at a local adult education centre right up to masters degrees at prestigious business schools and universities. You can even do a course from home.

The type of course that is right for you will depend on factors such as how much time you can devote to learning and how much you are willing or able to pay.

Other things to consider include whether you are happy to study on your own via the internet or much prefer to learn in groups of like-minded people.

Evening trading courses for beginners

At the more affordable end of the scale are evening classes. Harrow College, for example, runs a course called Stocks, Shares and Investments for Beginners. It is aimed at “anyone with an interest in the stock market wanting to build a portfolio”.

The syllabus includes how to buy and sell stocks, shares and other securities. Students need take only writing materials and a Financial Times and part of the assessment is a final night quiz.

Cost £107

Course lasts nine weeks

Strong coffee and the Financial Times needed when studying a trading course for beginners: VSamarkina/Shutterstock.com

Online trading courses for beginners

If a final night quiz in a building that could probably do with a bit of investment itself is not really your thing, there is the option of learning on your computer at home.

Online courses include an Introduction to Securities and Investment (UK) run by FitchLearning. It is part of the Fitch Group which specialises in financial information services.

Students need no prior knowledge and the course leads to a foundation qualification. The syllabus includes equities, bonds, derivatives and investment funds.

Cost £205

Course requires 80 hours of study

Short courses

Short courses is the area of trading courses for beginners that the back of the newspaper brigade specialise in. They promise that after just a few hours in their company you will be getting returns that seem too good to be true.

Often, courses seem too good to be true because they are too good to be true.

Be sure that the course is run by a name that you trust before parting with your money. The well-recognised Open University, for example, offers a module called Personal Investment in an Uncertain World.

Its prospectus says: “You will be shown how to build a portfolio, using financial and economic modelling (such as the Capital Asset Pricing Model), that manages and spreads risk while pursuing higher returns.”

Cost £1,432

Module lasts five months

Practical degrees

Be sure that the course is run by a name that you trust before parting with your money

If a finance-based degree is the sort of trading course for beginners that appeals, some universities offer courses that let you practise dealing without having to put up your own money.

The University of Brighton runs a sandwich course in Finance and Investment that features trading sessions in a simulated real-time trading room.

Students also get a year’s placement with a financial institution.

Typical careers after graduation are in the banking, investment and insurance industries.

Cost for a 2017 start is £9,250 a year

Course lasts four years including placement

Ready for a masters?

If you already have a first degree, a finance-based masters degree might be an option, although MBAs at the top business schools can cost an eye-watering amount.

The London Business School’s MBA fees for the two-year course starting this year are more than £75,000.

Many of these courses require relevant work experience so are not really suitable trading courses for beginners. But some investment masters degrees are open to holders of first degrees such as maths or computing.

Capital Com SV Investments Limited is a Cyprus Registered Company with Company Registration Number HE 354252. It is a regulated Cyprus Investment Firm, licensed by the Cyprus Securities and Exchange Commission (CySEC), under license number 319/17.Capital Com SV Investments is authorised to provide investment services in more than 20 European countries.It is an Investment Firm following the implementation of the Markets in Financial Instruments Directive (MiFID).

The information found on this website isn’t applicable to residents of the USA or Belgium and shall not be used or distributed in any country or jurisdiction where it goes against domestic legislation and regulations.

All content on this website belongs to Capital.com, unless stated otherwise. Any of the website content that belongs to Capital.com is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License. Whenever shared or adapted the content must be accompanied with appropriate credit to Capital.com with links or hypertexts leading to Capital.com and the initial page of the content's publication on Capital.com. All third-party owned content appearing on this website is subject to the rights of their respective owners and the applicable distribution rules.